Politics – ICAC
Sorry Gladys, but we need a strong Commonwealth ICAC more than ever
A line being peddled is that the New South Wales ICAC is a monster out of control. Barnaby Joyce even seems to be mounting an argument that boils down to the proposition that politicians should be exempt from any form of scrutiny.
Geoffrey Watson of the Centre for Public Integrity has written a strong defence of ICAC summarising the situation:
There is almost certain to be a negative backlash against ICAC. It will mainly be party political: Berejiklian was, after all, a generally popular politician. But that fact further stands to the credit of ICAC and its independence. At the time it was making the decision ICAC would have realised that there was certain to be a backlash, but it would have also recognised that it needed to make that decision irrespective of that fact. The decision had to be made in accordance with the facts, not in accordance with prejudices or preferences. ICAC will never back down because of intimidation.
He also has an 8-minute segment on the ABC’s Breakfast program where he goes into details about ICAC’s investigation into Gladys Berejiklian’s behaviour in public office, and defends ICAC as a model for a Commonwealth integrity commission. (He doesn’t like the term “corruption” in ICAC’s title – it leads to too many emotional interpretations.) He also recounts an instance where the Murdoch media smeared a Labor politician who was a witness in an ICAC hearing, conveying the impression he was appearing as one under investigation for corruption: the fault lay with the media, not with ICAC. Like others, he cannot understand why Berejiklian decided to resign rather than to stand aside.
Stephen Charles, also of the Centre for Public Integrity, comments on what is needed in a federal integrity commission: We need a federal watchdog with teeth, now more than ever. He is most critical of the Morrison government’s “spinelessly weak” exposure draft presently on the table, drafted by the former Attorney General Christian Porter. He describes it as “a fraud and a sham”.
Denis Muller of Melbourne University’s Centre for Advancing Journalism, is dismayed at the way much of the media has handled the Berejiklian case. This ICAC story is about the possible misappropriation of public money. It’s a story about probity and the public’s reasonable right to know about personal relationships between politicians and people who stand to benefit from government discretionary programs. But rather than that being the media story, sentiment has trumped probity, and that sentiment “is based on a narrative about a good woman and excellent state premier led astray by a rogue boyfriend who abused his relationship with her to advance his interests in ways that led to his being investigated for corruption. In the process, he dragged her down with him”: ICAC is not a curse, and probity in government matters. The Australian media would do well to remember that, in The Conversation.
Morrison and his ministers are relying on public sympathy for Berejiklian to gain support for its pathetically weak model which would be directed only to a narrowly-defined set of behaviours already covered by the law. For the most part, rorts uncovered by recent Auditor-General reports on car parks and sporting grants are not illegal. There was nothing illegal in Porter’s willing acceptance of $1 million from an anonymous donor. If, in the run-up to the coming election, Morrison were to direct that health or infrastructure funding be distributed to electorates proportional to their support for the Coalition, that would be quite legal.
In a 10-minute interview on the ABC’s Breakfast program on Tuesday – Where is the Commonwealth’s anti-corruption body? – Assistant Minister Amanda Stoker seemed to be attacking the New South Wales ICAC because it has investigated matters that are not legally defined as “corruption”. That misses the point, because corruption goes beyond basic adherence to the law. Some of the most egregiously corrupt governments take care to ensure that their behaviour falls within the law. In what may rate as an exemplar of smug arrogance, Stoker concluded her interview with the assertion “We should take heart that it is a coalition government driving this reform”.
As Richard Dreyfus explained on ABC’s Breakfast program on Wednesday, Labor's federal anti-corruption body will have all the powers of a standing royal commission. Labor’s objections to the governmental models are on several bases: a lack of retrospectivity, references to the commission to be made only by the government, and a general weakness in comparison with state commissions. He stresses that the commission proposed by Labor would not be a court. Its task, in line with other commissions, would be to examine evidence of serious and systemic corruption, not to prosecute. It’s up to the Director of Public Prosecutions to decide whether to prosecute anyone. He charitably suggests that Morrison and Stoker are confused, rather than the more likely explanation that they are terrified that the present and possible future Coalition governments’ corruption would be given more exposure. (12 minutes>?
Do not Morrison and his cronies understand that those who have access to taxpayers’ money and who are trusted to act in the public interest must abide by high standards of behaviour? Perhaps they don’t understand it. Or worse, perhaps they do.
Lest anyone believe all will be solved if we replace Morrison’s cronies with a Labor Government, Labor’s track record on state ICACs is somewhat short of angelic. Last month a bill to water down the powers of the South Australian ICAC passed through both houses of parliament without any MP from any party voting against the changes. If Labor is elected Albanese and Dreyfus should be held to their promises.